What goes in a rent ledger
Six columns cover almost every situation: date due, amount due, date paid, amount paid, method, and the running balance. Add a note for anything unusual, such as a partial payment, a late fee, or an agreed deferral.
Those notes are what make a ledger persuasive later, because they show the record was kept as events happened rather than reconstructed after a dispute started. The long version is in what is a rent ledger.
The ledger is also what you check before vouching for anyone. When a tenant asks for a reference, the free landlord reference letter template composes the letter around the same dates and amounts, so the claim you sign about their payment record matches the record.
When it is an agency or a lender asking rather than a tenant, they want the figures certified rather than described. The free rent verification form takes the same rows and prints them as a signed form, totals included.
The ledger closes out the money at the end of a tenancy, and the free move-in and move-out checklist closes out the unit: every area rated when the tenant arrived, rated again when they left, so the deposit conversation has the same kind of dated record behind it that the rent does.
When the rent changes mid-ledger, the amount due changes from the effective date and not from the date you decided. Note the change on the row it starts on, and keep the notice with it: the free rent increase letter template produces both the figure and the dated letter it came from.
Rent ledger or rent roll?
A rent ledger is deep and narrow: one unit, every payment, over time. A rent roll is wide and shallow: every unit you own, as of one date, showing current rent and occupancy. Use a ledger to settle a dispute about one tenant, and a rent roll to show a lender the whole portfolio. The free rent roll template builds that side for you, occupancy and totals included.
How long to keep it
Keep a ledger for as long as you might need to defend the tenancy, which in practice means the length of the tenancy plus your local limitation period for civil claims, and longer if the numbers feed a tax return. Rules vary by province and state, so check your own jurisdiction. More on that in which rental documents to keep.